Large Record Linkage Studies Show Women More Likely to Die After Abortion, Not Childbirth *

A new study of the medical records for nearly half a million women in Denmark reveals significantly higher maternal death rates following abortion compared to delivery. This finding has confirmed similar large-scale population studies conducted in Finland and the United States, but contradicts the widely held belief that abortion is safer than childbirth.

By linking records from Denmarks fertility and abortion registries to death registry records, the researchers examined death rates following the first pregnancy outcome for all women of reproductive age in Denmark over a thirty year period, charting death rates at 180 days, 1 year, and in each of 10 subsequent years following each womans first pregnancy outcome.

Significantly higher rates of death were observed among women who aborted in every time period examined (see Figure 1). Overall, the study found that women who had first-trimester abortions had an 89 percent higher risk of death within the first year and an 80 percent higher risk of death over the full time period studied.

Published in the Medical Science Monitor, this is the first record linkage study of maternal death rates associated with abortion to be published using Denmarks centralized health data. Record linkage studies of the population of Finland and of low income women in California have also found higher death rates associated with abortion.

Record Linkage Studies Eliminate Reporting Errors

The findings of these record linkage studies from three different populations contradict the conclusion that abortion is safer than childbirth. That view has traditionally been based on death certificates alone or on voluntary reporting to government agencies.

For example, a study published [...] concluded that the death rate associated with childbirth is 14 times higher than the death rate associated with abortion.

Yes, but...Women who would kill their preborn children are probably already living higher risk lifestyles, i.e., into drugs and other high risk activities from which they might die, as compared to women who settle down with a man and become wives and mothers.

4
posted on 09/05/2012 12:32:28 PM PDT
by libertylover
(The problem with Obama is not that his skin is too black, it's that his ideas are too RED.)

From the abstract of the paper, it does not appear that there was any attempt to control for the physical and emotional health of the women before the pregnancy, their age, their social-economic status, or the state of their relationship with the baby’s father, or their own parents for that matter.

Take a 17 y.o. girl with a family history of mental illness, put her in series of foster homes, let her be a binge drinker, experiment with drugs and have an off-and-on relationship with a violent boyfriend who has other girlfriends - she’s probably got a twenty-fold greater chance of dying than a happily married 23 y.o. college grad.

BTW, I wonder how a pro-choice academic refers to the unborn baby’s father. Can they write, the embryo’s mother, or the father of the fetus? That would confer a relationship on something that is not yet a person and is not capable of relationships.

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